


Maybe Next Time

by Peggo



Category: Cricket RPF
Genre: M/M, That's about it tbh, dumb pick up lines, get together ?, i can only write stupid stuff i'm so sorry, idk how else to describe this, it's just very stupid, joe is a Flirt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-10
Updated: 2020-08-10
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:26:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25812772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peggo/pseuds/Peggo
Summary: Joe tries to woo Jos with a series of terrible pick up lines.It works.
Relationships: Dom Bess/Sam Curran, Eoin Morgan/Ben Stokes/Mark Wood, Jimmy Anderson & Jos Buttler, Jimmy Anderson/Alastair Cook, Joe Root & Ben Stokes, Jonny Bairstow/Chris Woakes, Jos Buttler/Joe Root, Rory Burns/Ollie Pope, all relationships except joe and jos are varying degrees of IMPLIED
Comments: 8
Kudos: 17





	Maybe Next Time

**Author's Note:**

> OK this is some really dumb shit. It's very late where I am but I hope you enjoy nonetheless !

Joe is a naturally flirty person. It’s always been second nature, and Ben often has to make him aware that he’s even flirting with someone, and that he might be crossing over into ‘leading on’ when they’re out together. 

But the one person who finds himself the centre of Joe’s attention more often than anyone else is Jos Buttler. To the point where Joe and Jos have a quasi routine now of Jos paying absolutely no heed to Joe’s advances, and in return Joe tries even harder to get a rise from Jos. 

Ben thinks if Joe sat down with Jos and told him ‘I know I just told Chris that he was the only ten I see, but I actually, genuinely fancy you and have no idea how to act when feelings are reciprocated so are you a bank loan, because you have my interest’ then it might all be over, because Jos would definitely go on a date with Joe. 

Slowly, one by one, the rest of the team stopped receiving pick-up lines and winks from Joe, and Joe began to concentrate all his efforts on Jos. Jos, who remained unfazed by it all, despite Eoin and Jimmy’s pleas to just ‘put us out of our misery Jos, if you tell him ‘try again’ one more time we’re going to cry, what are you waiting for.’

* * *

It was the end of training and they’re in the dressing room. Joe was contentedly sitting between Ben’s knees, as the latter slowly worked the knots out of Joe’s shoulders and back. They’re all chatting about Sam and Bessie’s date from last night, placing bets on whether they kissed, ‘whether they did _more_ , if you know what I-’ ‘I didn’t need that mental image, Mark, thank _you_ ’, where they went, who payed, and various miscellaneous details (‘I bet Sam fell over’). 

Jos and Jonny come in, having finished slightly later for some extra wicket-keeping exercises and they’ve both had showers. Ben smiles as Joe sits up slightly straighter, noticing the wicket keepers' entry. 

“Did you just come out of the oven, Jos, because _wow_ you’re hot’ he calls over, as Jos puts his towel over the door of his cubby to dry. Jonny grins at Ben over the top of Joe’s head as Joe waits for the response, 

“Just the shower, Joey,” is all he gets from Jos, who has started to fold his jumper to put it in his bag, seemingly unaffected. 

Ben from his vantage point sees the tips of Joe’s ears flush crimson at Jos’ term of endearment, and rolls his eyes. 

* * *

Chris sees it coming when they organise a meal out in Notts. Hanging back with Jonny hand in hand they watch as Joe links arms with Mark and Jason, excitedly discussing the latest episode of whatever Netflix show they were watching at the time. Jos and Stuart are walking much more sedately, with Stuart pointing out his favourite spots (including a Pret à Manger, which took Jos by surprise because he’d had Stuart down as a snobbier guy than a pret guy, until Stuart had pointed up the street and complained that people will still choose the maccies up the road when Pret was right here and he felt the validation of being proved right.)

“So what do you think it’s going to be tonight?” Chris asks Jonny, rubbing his thumb over the side of Jonny’s hand. 

Jonny looks at Chris, a soft smile on his features, “What do you mean, sweetcheeks?”

Chris coughs, and attempts to disguise his own West Midlands accent with a Sheffield twinge, looking at Jonny as he says, “Are you a doughnut, because I find you a- _dough_ -rable.” Jonny throws his head back in laughter, and tries to reign it in as the rest of the lads look back at them, before regaining his composure and returning, 

“It’s an italian, it’ll be something stupid like, I _cannoli_ have eyes for you.”

“When the waiter comes over for the cheese, he’ll say something stupid like, ‘This may be cheesy but I think you’re _grate_.’” 

They go back and forth as they walk down the street to the restaurant, laughing as their pick up lines get worse and worse, occasionally stopping to press a kiss to the other's shoulder or nose. 

Ali and Jimmy are already sat at their table, much to Joe’s delight, who hadn’t been told Ali would be there. They settle down, with Joe talking animatedly to Ali, asking about the farm and the county cricket. Chris nudges Jonny under the table as the waiter comes over and Joe’s eyes start to sparkle.

Ali took the menus from the waiter, took one for himself and Jimmy, and passed them to his left to Joe. Joe, who paused with the menus, placed all but one on the table, opened it and looked at Jos. 

“Know what’s on the menu, cupcake?” He pauses, grinning, “Me’n’u.” 

It elicits a groan from the company, and Ben takes the menu from where Joe had left them on the table and continues handing them around the rest of the lads. He notices that Jos rolled his eyes, fondly, with a soft smile playing on his face. However, when he gets the menu, he opens it, looks at Joe and says, 

“I think I’d prefer the linguine, darling.”

* * *

Mark has to admire Joe’s dedication to the cause when they’re on a night out in Newcastle. They’d decided to go out for Ben’s birthday after a few drinks, and Joe drunk was infinitely worse than Joe sober when it came to flirting. Or maybe better, he certainly got more attention, because he did _more_ flirting. They’ve been at the club since eleven, and it’s now half three, and Mark reckons he’s the only sober one left (he definitely is, Mo left at half one and with him Mark’s sanity.) 

They’ve formed their own circle on the dance floor, chanting along to the music. Ben crosses their circle to wrap Mark up in his arms, mouthing at his neck as they ‘dance’. Mark knows that the club will probably be approaching closing (and that Ben looks really good in this shirt), and looks around the club to make sure they've got everyone before they order Ubers to go home. They’re missing Joe, and he scans the surroundings trying to find him.

Mark spots Joe propping up the bar, charming the bartenders and some other girls, drink in hand, though he probably doesn’t realise the effect he’s having. Mark starts tapping shoulders, motioning to the lads that maybe they should order the Ubers now, before it gets busy and they can go to the chippie across the road while they wait, grab some cheesy chips and gravy and try to sober up at least a bit. As they make their way through the club back to the exit, they go to collect Joe, who turns and whose eyes light up at the sight of Jos (who in turn was, incidentally, _less_ than pleased to see Joe surrounded by guys and girls alike). 

“Jos! My new friends bet me I wouldn’t be able to start a conversation with the most beautiful person in the club!” Joe's 'new friends' all laugh. Jos does not. “What should we do with their money, sweetheart?”

Jos relaxes, features softening, but doesn't reply, instead grabbing Joe’s forearm, and tugging him into a side hug. He uses this position to frog march Joe from the club, towards the chippie and _away_ from his 'new friends'. Mark smiles apologetically at the group, who return the smile, and one of them shrugs, with an ‘it’s cute, have a lovely night.’

* * *

It happens _in_ training too. Their test captain, their most senior batsman, shamelessly trying to get their wicket keeper’s attention. It’s a fielding drill, and the batsmen are taking it in turns to get quick singles (and running as soon as they hit the ball regardless), and the remainder of the team aiming for the stumps. 

Joe’s at the non strikers’ end, laughing at something Bessie has said as he goes up for his run up. They exchange words, which Jos can’t quite make out, and then Dom is hopping in to bowl. Ben makes good contact with the ball, and is off like a rocket, Joe similarly sprinting down the 22 yards of wicket. Unfortunately it’s landed quite near Dom Sibley’s feet and he turns to throw it to Jos’ end of the wicket, prompting Joe to dive to make it in, arms outstretched and bare arms scraping against the grass. 

Joe winces, looking at his now grazed elbows from where he’s lying on the ground, and Jos runs up to check he’s OK. 

“Do you have a band aid?” Joe asks, looking up at Jos and Jos panics, because Joe isn’t making much sense. He has a hefty graze along his left forearm, a band aid isn’t going to cover that, and does Joe expect him to carry band aids around in his cricket whites anyway? And then Joe grins wickedly, “Because I think I hurt myself falling for you.”

Jos actually groans out loud at the younger batsman, as Craig, their physio, comes over to clean out the cut. 

“Try again, some time when you’re not bleeding out.” is all Jos says, before returning to his position behind the stumps.

* * *

Jos finds great comfort in the escapism of reading. A completely separate world he can delve into, often without any cricket ever being mentioned. He’s a bookmark kind of guy, neat annotations in pencil in the margin (he knows Joe breaks spines and dogears pages, and he’s still trying to reconcile this in his head), and he likes to have a book in his bag on standby. 

Quite often, when they’re in hotels, the boys will be playing CoD or Fifa or the like, and Jos will pull out his book and sit on the bed reading, while the rest of his friends argue over fouls and errors. 

It’s one of those days, it’s raining outside and they’re in Chris and Jonny’s room, and Jonny, Jimmy and Stuart are on the PS4. Chris is making coffees with his new coffee machine, and Ollie, Rory, Sam and Dom are nattering away, complimenting Chris’ new barista skills and wishing the rain away. Jos is sat on the bed, a latte on the bedside table, book on his lap when there’s a knock on the door. Chris calls them in and Joe pokes his head around the door and smiles when he sees them all cramped into the hotel room. 

He throws himself across the bed that Jos is reading on, eyes shut, listening to the rain and a peaceful smile dancing on face. 

And just when Jos thinks it’s going to be uneventful, Joe cracks an eye open, looking at Jos, 

“If you were words on a page, you’d be the _fine_ print.”

Picking up where he left off on his page, Jos smiles and says, 

“Go to sleep, Joe, you’re delirious when you’re tired.”

* * *

Joe really is delirious when he’s tired, is the problem, thinks Ben during a movie night. They’d just finished up a particularly tense series, which always meant that Joe seemed to survive the final days on adrenaline alone, never getting enough sleep during the matches themselves. Added on to their post series celebrations, lasting until the early hours morning, Joe is always unrecognisable the day after. 

So Ben in turn always takes it upon himself to look after his best friend post-series by inviting their friends over, luring them in with hot chocolate and films in the late afternoon until they’re all asleep and wake up with cricks in their necks and go home. 

They’ve just finished Emperor’s New Groove, and Ben thinks Joe’s already asleep, despite it only being 5 in the afternoon. He knows once he’s out, he’ll be out until mid afternoon the following day. Joe’s face is pressed against the arm of the sofa, opposite Jos, who is moving from his spot on the floor to adjust Joe’s blanket. Eoin, bless his soul, had already made the bed in the spare room when he’d got back home the day before, so everything was set for Ben to take Joe to the next room. 

As Ben put his drink onto the coffee table, Rory’s phone goes off, and Joe stirs somewhat, to come face to face with Jos. He smiles, blearily, before shutting his eyes again, mumbling, 

“Someone better call _God_ , not Rory, because he’s missing an angel.”

The lads laugh, as Jos flushes, picking Joe up off the ground and thanking Ben for opening the doors to the spare room, replying softly to Joe, 

“I’m an atheist. Better luck next time.”

* * *

Sometimes Ali and Jimmy host game nights. They’re infrequent and rare, because each time the Anderson-Cooks host game night, they are reminded of how chaotic game night is, and are put off hosting for another couple of months. 

After a particularly unsuccessful game of charades that nearly left Sam in tears, (who put Anne of Green Gables in the hat, that’s not funny) (...it’s a little bit funny) and a couple of rounds of Mario Kart (which ended in Jason rage quitting after falling off Rainbow Road one too many times just before Ollie crossed the finish line in first place), Jimmy suggests Pictionary, in an attempt to restore the peace.

Ali searches for some pens and paper, and comes back with a flipchart easel, a mug of pens of varying ink quality and a packet of standard HB pencils, just in case. 

They spend half an hour trying to guess ‘Crime and Punishment’ from Stuart’s scribbling (after spending half the half hour being misled by Stuart’s cry of ‘nearly’ when Rory suggests ‘Pride and Prejudice’), Ali turns to Joe. 

“You can art, right, Joe? Put us out of our misery and draw a good ‘un.” 

Joe laughs, taking the pen from Stuart and flipping the paper over onto a clean sheet. He rummages in Jimmy’s hat before pulling out a name. Scrunching his nose up in disdain he swaps them out (‘That’s cheating’) (‘Shut up, Broady’) (‘Who put 1984 in the hat?’)

Satisfied with whatever it is that he's pulled from the hat this time, Joe takes a pen from the Sports Direct mug and begins to sketch an outline on his paper. 

The pen quickly dries up, and Joe takes another from the pot. 

“Your pens _suck_ , Ali. They keep running out. Although aren’t biros, like, gravity powered or something, so maybe they’re not made for this and that's why they don't work in space or something. I dunno. Chuck us the pencils, would you, Ol?”

The pencils fall short of Joe, from Ollie’s left handed and lazy throw from where he’s settled against Rory on the loveseat. Joe stoops to pick up the packet, taking a pencil from the box and turning back to his pictionary masterpiece. 

This time, when he goes to add to his drawing the graphite of the pencil breaks, and the tip falls off. Momentarily stunned Joe looks at the pencil sadly, as though personally upset by the snapped tip. There's a pause and then Joe turns around, holding the broken pencil in front of his face, before going to kneel in front of Jos. 

“Life without you is like a broken pencil, Jossy… _pointless_.”

Jos is still looking at Joe’s half finished sketch. 

“Alice in Wonderland.” 

He takes the broken pencil from Joe, and goes up to the board, taking a name from Jimmy’s hat, grinning as he turns back to look at Joe, still kneeling in front of the armchair Jos just vacated, looking simultaneously affronted and impressed. 

* * *

If being hit in the stomach by a 90mph cricket ball doesn’t stop Joe from using his pick up lines, then nothing will, Ollie muses. 

Jofra runs in, and Joe misses, instead taking a ball directly to his gut, bending over in half immediately winded. Jonny runs up from behind the stumps, it being his turn to keep to check on Joe. Joe accepts Jonny’s help, but waves away concern from the others. He takes a few minutes to remember how to breathe as the lads grab drinks and start to make plans for what they’re going to do after training. 

Joe’s still rubbing his stomach when he finally makes it over to where their drinks are, and he grins at them all. 

Ben smiles back, throwing Joe his water bottle and making a comment on how he’ll be sporting a fantastic bruise tomorrow. Joe laughs, replying that he probably already has one, thank goodness Jof’s on our team, eh lads. 

When they go back to training, Joe is immediately hit again, this time on the glove and by a delivery by Jimmy that just bounces and swings a bit more than anyone expected, and Chris Silverwood comes over in concern, as Joe shakes his hand out. 

“I’m absolutely fine, thanks, Chris. Something’s wrong with my eyes though.” Joe raises his voice for the latter half of his sentence, and Stuart rolls his eyes in preparation for what’s to come.

“What? Do we need Craig to check them over for you, or -”

“No, no, nothing of that sort thanks Chris. I just can’t seem to take them off Jos”

“You deserve to be hit ten times more by Jof’s bouncers, Joe.”

The boys laugh as Chris leaves the field again, shaking his head. 

* * *

“When are you going to put us out of our misery, Jos.” Jimmy asks as they drive to training, sharing a lift to Old Trafford. Jos’ lips quirk up somewhat and he takes a deep breath in before he replies, 

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Jimmy.” 

Jimmy scoffs, “I swear to God if I hear Joe tell you he’s in the mood for a _pizza_ you over Domino’s, or ask you whether you’re a broom, because you _sweep_ him off his feet again I am going to murder you, or him, or both of you, I don’t even care anymore. You can be happily in love in hell for all I care, just take it someplace else.” 

Jos laughs, casting a sidelong glance at Jimmy. 

“And what would Ali say if you murdered his favourite England cricketer, or his favourite England cricketer’s second favourite cricketer.” At Jimmy’s raised brow Jos smiled, “I’m not so arrogant as to believe Ali isn’t Joe’s favourite England cricketer. I’ll take second.”

Jimmy smiles, which Jos counts as a win, and a promise that he won’t actually be murdered. 

They arrive at the car park and Jos puts the handbrake on. 

“Anyway, I have something planned for today, so you don’t need to worry.” He gets out the car as Jimmy cries, ‘thank _fuck_ , because if I hear one more ‘Jos you don’t need to do this drill, you must be tired from running through my mind’, I will throw someone out of the window.’ And they climb the stairs to the dressing room in relative silence, broken only by Jimmy's grumbling.

Training itself is uneventful, the boys working hard, acutely aware of the approaching series against New Zealand. After training, Ben syncs his phone to his bluetooth speaker, and puts on a playlist as everyone packs up to fill the tired but companionable silence that has filled the dressing room. When Joe asks what playlist Ben is playing, and Ben answers ‘just the latest release’, Jos hears Jimmy mutter, ‘please for the love of all things good -’ as he takes off his left shoe,

“Well then, I really ought to complain to Spotify for Jos not being named this week’s hottest single.”

Jimmy walks straight out of the room, without even taking his right shoe off, as Mark hoots and cheers for Joe’s pick up line. Jos allows himself to crack a smile, and waits for the noise to die down. He zips up his bag, and pretends he’s not affected at all as he leaves. Jimmy has come back in and they get up to go back to Jos’ car and go home.

Right at the door he pauses, lips quirking upwards, hand still on the door handle. Without turning around he says, 

“I can’t wait for our date, Joe. How long until you actually ask me out on one?” And then makes his way to the car, accompanied by Jimmy and his mumblings of ‘thank fuck that’s over.’

* * *

(It is not over. They go on a lovely date, where Joe tells Jos that if he were a vegetable, he’d be a _cute-cumber_ , and if anything the pick-up lines only get worse.) 

(Jimmy tells Ali it’s going to send him to an early retirement.)

(Ali knows Jimmy actually finds the whole thing incredibly endearing and in reality probably enjoyed the pick up lines the most out of everyone.)

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed even if it's the dumbest premise ever !!  
> Xx


End file.
